Liverpool’s ongoing pursuit of Bradley Barcola could be about to take another eye-catching twist over the next 48 hours, according to a well-respected online source.The Reds have reportedly reached an agreement with the Paris Saint-Germain winger on a prospective five-year contract at Anfield, but they’ve yet to present a financial package which’d get the approval of the Champions League holders, who’ve set an asking price of £128m (TEAMtalk).Luis Enrique’s side will play their first official fixture of the season when they take on Aston Villa in the UEFA Super Cup on Wednesday night, although the 23-year-old’s participation in that match has seemingly been put into doubt.Barcola could miss Super Cup due to ‘illness’A respected source on X has claimed on Tuesday morning that Barcola ‘could pull out of’ the fixture in Salzburg ‘at the last second’ because of “illness”, with that latter word notably placed in quotation marks in the post.It’s added that a decision on the PSG winger’s involvement in that game will be ‘made soon’ and ‘could go either way’, with the team news expected to be released 75 minutes before kick-off.Want more Empire of the Kop coverage? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list for news you can trustBarcola speculation would ramp up if he misses Super CupIt could well be the case that Barcola is genuinely ill, which’d make his potential absence for the Super Cup perfectly legitimate, but such is the intensity of speculation regarding his future that any such party line will inevitably be treated with external suspicion.It’s been abundantly reported that the winger is prepared to leave Paris, with Fabrizio Romano claiming that the 23-year-old has given the ‘final green light’ on personal terms over a prospective move to Liverpool.In that context, reports of an illness on the eve of PSG’s next fixture are bound to be met with cynicism and fuel speculation that he could well be on his way to Anfield sooner rather than later.However, even if the Reds can stump up a fee to the Parisians’ liking, data analyst Michael Reid explained (via X), that we’ve now hit our maximum quota of non-homegrown players following the arrival of Ronald Araujo on loan from Barcelona.It could therefore necessitate a senior departure from Liverpool in order to make room for Barcola in Andoni Iraola’s squad, but with three weeks of the transfer window remaining, there’s still time for major ins and outs to occur before the deadline.For now, all eyes will be on the PSG team sheet tomorrow night to see if their number 29 is included.The post Respected source issues eye-catching Barcola claim which could nudge him closer to Liverpool move appeared first on The Empire of The Kop.